The Undefeated [VHS]

The Undefeated [VHS]
by Andrew V. McLaglen

The Undefeated [VHS]

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Product details

Actor: Antonio Aguilar, John Wayne, Marian McCargo, Rock Hudson, Roman Gabriel
Director: Andrew V. McLaglen
Cinematographer: William H. Clothier
Editor: Robert L. Simpson
Producer: Robert L. Jacks
Writer: James Lee Barrett
Writer: Lewis B. Patten
Writer: Stanley Hough
Edition: VHS Tape
Audio: English (Original Language), Analog; French (Original Language); Spanish (Original Language); English (Published), Analog
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Full Screen, HiFi Sound, NTSC
Running Time: 119 minutes
Release Date: 2003-05-20
Audience Rating: G (General Audience)
Publisher: 20th Century Fox
Studio: 20th Century Fox

VHS Movie Reviews of The Undefeated [VHS]

Movie Review: If I can be permitted to point to the title...
Summary: 4 Stars

Boy, let me clear my eyes a minute and write about this movie.
I saw it today on a day off in summer on a TV channel. It might be a good one if you were thinking of hosting a round-up. First the title tells us quite a bit. John Wayne plays a former Yankee Colonel who is selling a huge herd of horses to Maximillian for the bucks. Three thousand, with his band of former Union fighting loyal men and adopted son Blueboy a Cherokee footballer (Roman Gabriel looking very handsome). Yes, initially what pulled me into the movie was Wayne calling this brave his adopted son and naming him Blueboy, that and my spending an hour trying to place him. It isn't terribly honorable to deal with Maximilian but they are tired of having nothing but war and pain I think.

On the way to Mexico to collect their cash for horses they are ambushed by a troop of bandits after meeting a Confederate troop that have suffered the loss of the war, this Confederate family and soldier band going to Maximilian now I guess for a new start? Unable to stay in America? This group includes Rock Hudson, his wife Mederidith Baxter, his daughter and he's playing a Colonel too.He and Wayne were fun to watch.

That made me think of the movie title because in a way both groups are dealing with defeat. Hudson's group unable to accept it, Wayne's feeling the sting of a way different kind of defeat. They've lost friends, fought, got nothing to show for it and are darn tired. So in this money racked horse deal they kind of have to work together fending off the bandits, then a big and rather stressing meeting up with Benito Juarez Mexican independence revolutionaries aiming to get those horses.They take the entire Conferate group for ransom and wayne and men give away the horses to save them ultimately. Talk about reconciliation!

Along the way each man, Wayne and Hudson reveal their honor. Their ability to accept defeat, to work together to save the families, to see the things they will fight for, it's pretty classic stuff. Blueboy is Wayne's adopted son, a real man of honor that gets wrapped up in his wanting the Southern Colonel's daughter. Wayne gets a love interest too in the form of the sister in law to this southern Colonel mourning her loses of her man killed at a Civil war battle Wayne has been involved in on the other side. It's really a movie about all of that -one side against another and how perspectives and situations frame who we are, what we do.

Yes, I cried. I got afraid it wasn't going to go well at the end and the scenes of execution got to me. As the dastardly freedom fighter says, "War is war."
And everyone is looking at the defeated and the notions of winning.

Movie Review: oater
Summary: 5 Stars

the greatest western star of all time john wayne jumps off the screen and becomes real for an hour and forty five minutes. You'll love every minute of it.

Movie Review: White Men Stick Together
Summary: 1 Stars

I've seen this film several times and I always find it disturbing because it strikes me as classic Hollywood in that though the Civil War is central to the film, at no point is slavery ever mentioned. Which is to say that the film turns on the reconciliation of North and South and their mutual interests, which come to the fore as they are fighting Mexicans. Though I must say that the scene with Wayne and Hudson swigging bourbon as they recount the war is entertaining, ultimately, the film's unwillingness to explore the nature of their difference--which could be their differing notions of whether people should be property (albeit John Wayne's films generally portray his relations with people of color as paternalistic at best), is left unexplored, as if the Civil War was some kind of minor family squabble that requires whites rediscovering their mutual interests to overcome. It could be that this is a film about honor, but it feels more to me like the usual Hollywood distortion of history.

Movie Review: Not a great film, but better than almost anything you can see today
Summary: 5 Stars

"The Undefeated" (Nov. 1969) was completely overshadowed by "True Grit" (June 1969). There is no way Col. John Henry Thomas can compete with Rooster Cogburn. Some people fault this film and even Rock Hudson spoke ill of it. However, I enjoyed watching more than I have enjoyed a great many modern movies. Sure, the plot is kind of screwy. I mean, how many Confederate military units moved their wives and kids to Mexico? But people do crazy things after losing a war. It may be hard to believe, but there were many in the South who regard that War Between the States as inconclusive and that the wrong side claimed victory. You do not have to look very hard to find whole groups of these people on the Internet today. So, the movie is kind of topical in that way.

So, the movie has one band of Confederates led by Rock Hudson (Col. James Langdon) headed towards Mexico under the protection of Emperor Maximilian. The other party is led by John Wayne (Col. John Henry Thomas) who has just retired from the military and wants to sell 3,000 wild horses to the U.S. Army to get money for his men to split as a final payday before they all head home. Of course, the groups become aware of each other and the plot twists involve how the groups of Yanks and Rebs interact. To make things more complicated there are Mexicans who want those horses, too.

There are many familiar faces in the film that make it a lot more fun: Harry Carey, Jr., Ben Johnson, Paul Fix, and others such as Dub Taylor. The movie also reflects its time by casting two famous football players. The L.A. Rams quarterback plays Wayne's adopted Indian son, Blue Boy and the great L.A. Rams defensive lineman (and later spokesman for FTD florists) plays Cpl Little George in the Confederate band. The female leads are all Confderate women. The Lanford daughter, Charlotte, is played by Melissa Newman, and the older sisters (one is a widow and a semi love interest for Wayne), are played by Lee Meriwether and Marian McCargo.

There are a variety of twists and turns and questions about the ideas about good guys and bad guys rotates around Wayne and his band throughout the movie.

Not great, but certainly enjoyable.

Reviewed by Craig Matteson, Ann Arbor, MI

Movie Review: John Wayne - SUPER STAR
Summary: 5 Stars

John Wayne - a western icon, but excellent in whomever he is portraying. My wife enjoys John Wayne so much that it is not uncommon for her to watch two movies a day - that's because she has so many of them and continually adding more to the collection. He IS the character he portrays, and the viewer feels his emotion and emphathy for whichever character he portrays.

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Summary of The Undefeated [VHS]

In the tumultuous aftermath of the Civil War, Union Calvary officer John Henry Thomas takes his heroic men west while southerner James Langdon takes his soldiers to Mexico. When their paths cross, they forge an uneasy friendship that is quickly tested as they get caught between Mexican rebels and the Emperor's forces, and find themselves fighting side by side.

John Wayne, that pillar of machismo, was well aware that costar Rock Hudson was gay, yet he prized him as a boon companion, a fellow professional, and one hell of a bridge player. Each plays a Civil War commander who, after the ceasefire, leads a community of home folks into Mexico to make a fresh start. Hudson is a Southern gentleman; Wayne commanded the Yankee cavalry at Shiloh, where Hudson's brother died. Nevertheless, Rock, with his extended family, and Duke, with his troop of cowboys and 3,000 horses to sell to Emperor Maximilian, soon join forces to outgun banditos and beam paternally over the budding romance between their respective daughter and son (an adopted Indian played by footballer Roman Gabriel with Crystal Gayle hair). Lingering North-South animosities are celebrated in an obligatory communal fistfight in the Andrew V. McLaglen manner, and the showdown with both Maximilian's lancers and the rebel Juaristas is disconcertingly perfunctory. --Richard T. Jameson

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